Vengeance Is Mine

by Shiden Kanzaki

  “Hey, what happened?”

  “Who won?”

  “Someone go look.”

  Rentaro felt a sudden tap on his shoulder and turned around to see Shoma looking at him with a grave expression on his face. “What do you think, Satomi?”

  “I don’t know… But thinking about it rationally, the self-defense force probably won.” Rentaro stopped talking and looked up, into the darkness. “Right now, I can’t hear the voices of the Gastrea or the sound of the cannons. It’s probably because they drove the Gastrea away.”

  He had said that mainly to make himself feel better. Then, he looked at Hidehiko Gado. “Hey, you. Why don’t you try sending a flare up to headquarters to sound things out?”

  The oval-faced company commander shook his head like there was no way he could. “None of the other squads are doing that, are they? We can’t act arbitrarily on our own!”

  Rentaro was about to protest that they should do it because no one else was doing it but then shook his head. This man’s thinking was so different from his own that it didn’t matter what Rentaro said.

  Suddenly, Tina, who had been peering into the darkness quietly this whole time, murmured quietly, “Big Brother, someone’s coming.”

  “You can see them?” Rentaro asked. Then, he remembered that Tina was an Initiator with the Owl Factor in her body. Her eyes had the ability to amplify even the tiniest bit of light and project it onto her field of vision.

  “Yes, there are people walking this way. And it’s not just one or two of them.”

  Before long, as if backing up Tina’s words, shadows of people appeared blurrily about a hundred meters in front of them, near where the limit of the light of the bonfires reached, and he could see shadows walking toward them.

  There were about fifty people walking in a line, side by side. They were all SDF officers wearing digital camouflage that met the technical specifications for the year 2031. Among the civil officers an obvious sense of relief spread, and Rentaro could see some civil officers break rank to rush forward and tend to them.

  But Rentaro felt uneasy.

  Thinking about it rationally, they probably came to report that they successfully drove away the Gastrea. But then, why did they send so many people? It would have been enough to radio the information over, so they couldn’t all be messengers. Even if he allowed that they would send messengers, then one, or at most, two, would have been enough. And they weren’t even riding motorcycles.

  Slowly, they grew bigger in his field of vision. They seemed to be injured and were walking unsteadily. Seeing them, the Initiator from the team right next to Rentaro couldn’t help but rush out toward them. She was a girl about eight years old. As an Initiator, she was probably just barely old enough to bear fighting. She had soft curly hair, and she looked kind. As she rushed toward the injured fighters, she peeked up at the faces from below, showing consideration for the soldiers. Then, abruptly, she stopped moving.

  At that moment, Rentaro also noticed something out of place. The soldiers were walking calmly, even as they held in their intestines that were spilling out of their stomachs. And they had gotten close enough that their expressions could be seen—their faces were ashen and their lips blue. The blood spilling out of their cut stomachs soaked bright red into their camouflage uniforms. From their half-open lips came cryptic groans.

  There was no question that they had lost more than a fatal amount of blood. It was an unpleasant sight that they were all too familiar with, and they all got chills.

  Rentaro called out to the girl. “Get away! Don’t go near them!”

  The girl turned back, looking like she was about to cry.

  Suddenly, everything above her neck disappeared. The next instant, blood spurted forcefully into the air like a geyser. The girl’s legs became tangled, and her body fell forward.

  There was a stifling stink of blood. Right next to Rentaro, there was a thud as something about the size of a basketball fell to the ground.

  He froze with his eyes wide open. He could not for the life of him find the courage to turn his head a little to look there.

  As if waiting for that moment, all the soldiers’ bodies burst open from the inside. What appeared from each was eight legs that included a set of two large pincers. Bodies, flattened, slid parallel to the ground, but their backs arched and at the tips of their gigantic tails shone things that looked like sharpened blades.

  Arachnids—mottled scorpion Gastrea—appeared, attacking with red eyes glittering. One made a giant leap into the adjuvant next to them. Even though it was still a larva, it was so sudden that they were too late and were cut, screaming with a shower of blood.

  Looking around, Rentaro could hear screams and shouts from different directions, and their ranks became a melee. Just then, from the centerline where the general commander was, a howitzer shot something into the air with a long white trail of smoke. It stretched far and then opened up a parachute high in the sky. It scattered oxidizing materials, combustible materials, flame-coloring materials, and brightening materials that were fastened to the lower part of it into the sky, giving birth to a small sun.

  It was a flare.

  One after another, parachutes opened, and in no time, a number of lights were in the air, greatly expanding how far they could see. Rentaro shielded his eyes with his hand and narrowed his eyes.

  Then, he took a step backward in shock.

  The strong light exposed a small mountain of countless silhouettes. They were probably two or three kilometers ahead. They were all various types of Gastrea, big and small. As if they had been waiting for that moment, red dots suddenly appeared in the darkness. When Rentaro realized that they were all the red eyes of Gastrea, he gave an involuntary groan. In order to approach the civil officer camp unnoticed, they had closed their eyes and tread softly.

  What was really frightening was their number. The Seitenshi’s prediction was that there were about two thousand Gastrea gathered outside the walls, but this was at least twice that. The self-defense force that was supposed to act as the advance guard was nowhere to be seen. And yet, the vanished SDF troops and the additional Gastrea seemed to balance each other out in his mental arithmetic.

  “There’s no way…” His stomach dropped, and he felt like hurling. How did the Gastrea Legion manage to defeat the entire self-defense force? The SDF should have had the knowledge to completely shut out the Gastrea the way they had in the Second Kanto Battle.

  The Gastrea realized they had been exposed by the flares, and so, no longer needing to hide, they looked toward the sky en masse and gave a loud howl. The air rumbled, sending Rentaro’s skin prickling. Finally, a conspicuously large Gastrea at the front rushed toward them, and the rest followed, one after another, making a number of rhombus-shaped battle formations. The front line drove toward the civil officers in a straight line, tips of their swords aimed forward.

  The invaders let out a rumbling war cry, one that sent a crack through the ground and clouds of dirt alike, to the point where it was hard to tell if it was the ground shaking or the entire earth. Sweat poured from Rentaro’s frame, and the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.

  What was with these Gastrea that could follow orders? They didn’t look like a troop of Gastrea, they looked like a school of fish that had gathered together, resembling one giant organism. Even humans who had trained for years would have had a hard time moving together like this.

  Just then, a piercing pain stabbed into Rentaro’s head. He felt like he had noticed something important, but the thought had dispersed before becoming clear.

  Enju came close to him with an uneasy expression on her face and squeezed Rentaro’s palm tightly.

  The Gastrea were less than two kilometers away.

  The civil officer troops were also experiencing a precipitous drop in morale. Even battle-hardened veterans were struck with fear.

  “E-everyone, prepare for battle!” Hidehiko instructed his subordinate adjuvants, but his voice
shook, and the hand he raised into the air was weak.

  “Everyone, prepare for battle!” Rentaro repeated the order. Realizing that his own voice also sounded slightly nervous, he made an effort to stop his teeth’s chattering. He drew his XD gun from his hip and pulled the slide so it would be ready to fire at a moment’s notice.

  The Gastrea were one kilometer away.

  As the Gastrea slowly closed in on them, every single one of the civil officer troops seemed racked with nerves.

  Five hundred meters away.

  Reinforcing the front lines were the crustacean- and beetle-type Gastrea. Their forewings and bodies hardened with keratin and chitin were made into even harder armor by the Gastrea factor, and they glittered as they reflected the flares they were being hit with one after another.

  An adjuvant line that was equipped with rifles took a step forward and fired them at the commander’s signal. There was the dry sound of bullets firing while muzzle flashes dazzled their eyes. The NATO-standard, high-speed Varanium rifle cartridges rushed into the first line of Gastrea. They were bullets optimized for destroying the insides of Gastrea, and would change into a mushroom shape to expand the wounds. The Gastrea’s flesh would be ripped apart in the display of attack power. That was what was supposed to happen.

  Rentaro let out an involuntary shout.

  The Gastrea did not fall. Surprisingly, the beetle Gastrea in the front row did not stop even after receiving wounds that would have incapacitated normal Gastrea long ago. The rifle squad faltered, but they soon fired again continuously. Over the sound of blood splattering and flesh ripping apart was the strange sound of the Gastrea roaring with all their might.

  They finally brought down a few Gastrea after blowing their heads off, but those were soon trampled and detoured around, and a hopeless number of Gastrea gushed forth. The number that had been taken down was a lot smaller. It was as if they could not feel pain.

  Rentaro didn’t really understand what had happened, but instinctively, he understood one of the ways they had broken through the SDF.

  Three hundred meters away.

  “Big Brother, over there!” Tina shouted.

  Rentaro put his face next to Tina’s. She was pointing at something in the air. At first, it was too dark to see anything, but then a flare exploded close by. A squad of flying Gastrea appeared in the area where the veil of darkness had been lifted. There were a little less than fifty of them.

  The problem was the round objects they were carrying between their front and back legs: other Gastrea. In other words, paratroopers. When that realization struck, chills shot down Rentaro’s spine.

  The flying Gastrea seemed uncomfortable at having light shined on them and tilted their bodies to move away from it, taking a large detour around the air above the civil officer troops and going behind even the area where they had set up tents, landing in the forest behind the backs of the civil officer troops. They released the Gastrea they were holding and then returned to the front lines.

  Rentaro looked at Tina. “Did you see that, Tina?”

  Tina paused. “Yes,” she said. Seeming to understand the seriousness of the situation, Tina gave a quiet nod. That was probably a detached force sent to attack the civil officer troops in a pincer attack.

  Rentaro looked around, but it did not look like anyone else had noticed. Rentaro made up his mind and ran, going for the front line where Hidehiko Gado was commanding the rifle squad. When he got there, he put his hand on the man’s shoulder and whirled him around. “There’s a detached force behind us. We’re going to be caught in a pincer attack. Let us go fight it.”

  “Don’t you understand that this is no time for that?!” shouted Hidehiko.

  “If they get through from behind, then it really will be over. We’ll be completely wiped out!”

  Hidehiko waved his arm in front of him with bloodshot eyes. “Right now, we have to deal with the Gastrea in front of us. Get back in line, Satomi!”

  Rentaro wanted to object more, but he controlled himself. Turning around, he went back to his adjuvant, where everyone on his team was waiting for him with uneasy expressions.

  “Satomi, what is it?” Kisara asked on behalf of the group, meeting his eyes. He hesitated for a second but then explained the developments as briefly as possible.

  “That’s serious!” said Tamaki, taken aback.

  Shoma watched Rentaro silently as he listened. “Satomi, what do you want to do?”

  “I want to go fight the enemy on our own.”

  Enju looked uneasy. “Rentaro, but that means…”

  Rentaro nodded silently. That would mean disobeying orders from his superior officer, Hidehiko Gado. During the civil officer training they had undergone these past few days, Rentaro and the others had been given detailed instructions about the severe punishment that awaited them if they disobeyed orders.

  Yuzuki contemplated for a while, and then looked to Rentaro. “You decide, Rentaro Satomi. I’ll do as you say, Leader.”

  The adjuvant members all looked upon him as well, waiting expectantly for his decision.

  “I…” he started.

  Just then, a thunderous shout reached their ears. “Cease fire!”

  When Rentaro turned to look, he saw that the rifle squad was moving back under Hidehiko’s instructions, passing the baton to the civil officers who had close-combat weapons. Rentaro’s adjuvant had more close-combat fighters, so they were supposedly part of that group. Rentaro and the others moved forward, as if being pushed by the rifle squad and their paranoid gazes.

  The Gastrea were a hundred meters away.

  The rumbling of treaded ground combined with war cries to bring about the thunderous roar of the Gastrea. There was no sign of the enemy decreasing. What was going on?

  Rentaro’s sense of crisis increased. No matter how he thought about it, he was far from being able to take an optimistic view of the situation. Looking left and right, he saw that the other adjuvants shared his anxiety.

  A young man to his right with hair sticking up like a rockhopper penguin was coincidentally the leader of the adjuvant next to them at camp, as well. Even though Rentaro was often hated by other civil officers for being an upstart, when the young man found out Rentaro was ranked 300, he put his hand on Rentaro’s shoulder and said with an affable smile, “I’m proud to be fighting next to you.”

  Rentaro ground his clenched teeth together. If he left right now, there was a possibility that the space left by his absence would cause the death of Hidehiko Gado or the neighboring leader. They were getting close to the time limit. A little longer and Rentaro would be saved by the easy ending that they had run out of time. In that sense, the choice of not choosing anything was undeniably an option.

  However, if the surprise Gastrea attack squad reached them without being noticed and they were completely overtaken from behind, they would lose more than ten or a hundred people. The last breakwater would burst, and Gastrea would flow into Tokyo Area.

  Rentaro took deep breath after deep breath and looked forward. This was no time to hesitate. It was time to move. “Let’s go.” He turned as he said this, and everyone nodded gravely.

  Watching each Promoter put arms around his or her Initiator, Rentaro also stood next to Enju and put an arm around her waist; she put her strong arm around his. His eyes met Enju’s; her black ones turned a deep crimson. The next instant, he was hit with pressure pushing down on his body. It had been a while since he had last felt the acceleration that seemed like it would blow him away. Enju had awakened her Rabbit Factor.

  They flew over the sky above the columns of civil officers in large parabolas, heading for the back. Rentaro’s uniform flapped in the gale, and it was hard to open his eyes in the wall of air pressing in on him. When Rentaro’s feet touched the ground again, he gasped as he pulled air into his lungs.

  Looking back at what they had left behind, he saw that most of the people were staring at them with their mouths open, not understanding what had ju
st happened. However, one person—Hidehiko—grasped his fist tightly, shaking with anger.

  Rentaro felt a second of guilt, but he soon shifted his concentration on what was in front of him. Checking to make sure his whole team had followed, he went through the frontline base where they had camped for the last few days and into the forest that had been at their backs until now.

  Rentaro squinted through the wall of air that came at him and instructed Enju and the others to gather in the forest. It was dark there, and full of sticky, humid summer air. Once together, he made sure everyone knew the rough position of where the Gastrea had been last spotted, and then set off. The group moved by holding on to the Initiators, borrowing their ability to move at high speeds. With the Owl and Cat in the lead with their night vision, the adjuvant members jumped through the tops of the trees like ninjas.

  Leaves grazed Rentaro’s cheeks, and his gaze went left and right dizzyingly. Enju landed on a thin branch, and crouched to start another massive leap. This time, his chin was pulled down, and his vision rose and fell, practically giving him vertigo.

  Kisara, who had just newly formed a pair with Tina, looked like she was having a hard time with the girl’s freely changing directions, but Rentaro couldn’t say anything because he was having a hard enough time trying not to be thrown off by Enju’s superfast acceleration.

  Inside the still forest, four pairs forming a total of eight people were advancing, rustling the leaves as they jumped.

  Rentaro’s heart had been beating hard for a while as he stared in front of him at the impending confrontation. Some time had already passed since the airdropped Gastrea had landed; they’d most likely started moving already. If they were planning a surprise attack on the back of the front lines, then they would soon come across each other.

  Just then, there was a loud explosion behind them, followed by the sound of weapons firing. The main civil officer troops beyond the forest were finally fighting the Gastrea front lines head-on.